In the card game Race for the Galaxy, players build galactic civilizations by playing game cards in front of them that represent worlds or technical and social developments. Some worlds allow players to produce goods, which can be consumed later to gain either card draws or victory points when the appropriate technologies are available to them. These are mainly provided by the developments and worlds that are not able to produce, but the fancier production worlds also give these bonuses.

At the beginning of each round, players each select, secretly and simultaneously, one of the seven roles which correspond to the phases in which the round progresses. By selecting a role, players activate that phase for this round, giving each player the opportunity to perform that phase's action. For example, if one player chooses the settle role, each player has the opportunity to settle one of the planets from their hand. The player who has chosen the role, however, gets a bonus that applies only to him. But bonuses may also be acquired through developments, so one must be aware when another player also takes advantage of his choice of role.

Race for the Galaxy's development began when Thomas Lehmann, at Alea's request, started work on a card game version of Puerto Rico in parallel with Andreas Seyfarth's own. Their independent efforts resulted in some degree of collaboration, and though some of Mr. Lehmann's design ideas did make it into what eventually became San Juan, he continued to develop his concepts, taking the theme and other elements from an unpublished customizable card game he had previously designed.

Race for the Galaxy benefits from an unusually thorough development process, involving thousands of test games and the deliberate design of an unusually coherent iconography (by onigame and the graphics designer, Mirko Suzuki) as well as a unique approach to player interaction that prevents direct conflict and encourages "parasitic conflict".

Expansions

Four expansions have been published, adding new cards, game features, start worlds, as well as supporting up to 6 players and solo play. A fifth expansion has been announced. Each expansion arc required the base game and is not officially compatible with the other arcs.

First Arc - The Descent into War
The first expansion arc comprises 3 expansions, each of which is designed to be played with the earlier expansions. The storyline covers the exploration of the galaxy and the growing conflict between the Galactic Imperium and the Rebels.

The first is The Gathering Storm (2008), adding goals, solitaire play, another player, and drafting rules.

The second is Rebel vs Imperium (2009), adding military takeovers and another player.

Rio Grande Games granted permission to release a Race for the Galaxy AI to the public. Great for solitaire play and refining your RftG skills, it also now features online play. Posted by mrkeldon, may he be granted many Thumbs, donations, and GG!
BGG Thread: Race for the Galaxy AI
AI Link: http://keldon.net/rftg/

Set of tools & a tutorial to make homemade cards. Tutorial uses GIMP (freeware image editor). Any questions or requests can be addressed to the forum thread http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/1319096/new-card-tools

I recently started playing RFTG again, and didn't carry the goal cardboard around due to it not fitting in the box I had. So I took the goals from all three expansions, and turned them into cards, which I sleeve, and now everything fits in the box.
Print on US_LETTER sized paper, cut, optionally sleeve, and use as goals, instead of the thicker cardboard pieces.

This is my first attempt at creating brief descriptions of each of the cards in the base game of Race for the Galaxy. Because I'm new to the game, I found that creating this helped me get my arms around all the cards and their special powers.
Please comment if you see mistakes. I wouldn't be surprised if I made a bunch or wasn't clear in some of my descriptions.

Tuckboxes for sleeved RFTG cards. There is a box large enough to handle all of the base worlds and developments. It is a very tight print however. Also included is a separate Action/Start Worlds box that accommodates added player cards and boxes for both TGS and RvI. I will update with BoW and AA boxes as I add those expansions to my collection. Created using tuckbox.gameupdates.com